48 “What a bore”: Sunday Express, 5/21/61.
49 “ ‘look at these pictures’ ”: Interview with Ardmore, 7/5/72.
50 “Every writer ought”: Abby Mann to ST, 7/10/61, Abby Mann Collection, USC.
51 “AFTER FINISHING NUREMBERG”: ST to Abby Mann, 7/18/61 (courtesy of Abby Mann).
52 set a budget: Cost figures on The Devil at 4 O’Clock are from the Mervyn LeRoy Collection (AMPAS).
53 “Kate’s the lunatic”: Higham, Kate, p. 191.
54 “I wanted Spencer”: Ibid., p. 188.
55 “she got him set up”: Stanley Kramer to Heeley and Kramer.
56 press conference: Details of the world premiere in Berlin are from Los Angeles Times, 12/14 and 12/24/61; New York Times, 12/15/61; and Variety, 12/27/61. See also Bob Considine, “ ‘Judgment’ is Potent,” New York Journal American, 12/18/61.
57 “There was a buffet”: Stanley Kramer to Heeley and Kramer. “At the end of the screening the applause came almost exclusively from the foreign element in the theater,” Harold Myers reported in Variety, “and it seemed as if the locals were stunned into silence.”
58 “fair and human”: Variety, 12/27/61.
59 “reservations”: Variety, 10/18/61.
60 “raw force”: Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., “Movies: Judgment at Nuremberg,” Show, December 1961.
61 “I had a friend”: Frank Tracy to Selden West.
62 “quite disturbed”: Eddie Lawrence to Selden West.
63 “Tracy is ornery”: Bill Davidson, “Spencer Tracy,” Look, 1/30/62.
64 “Kate, my Kate”: Bill Davidson, Spencer Tracy: Tragic Idol (New York: Dutton, 1988), p. 145. Tracy did indeed submit to an interview with Bill Davidson (likely in 1960, rather than 1959 as the author states). However, Davidson used very few direct quotes from Tracy in his Look profile, and the “interview” recounted in his book is fascinating in its clumsy inventions. The suggestion that Tracy would sit for an on-the-record interview with an unfamiliar journalist and refer to Hepburn as “Kate, my Kate” is, in itself, ridiculous. Davidson quotes Tracy (supposedly in 1959) on the subject of his daughter, Susie: “Would you believe it but that little button wrote herself the cutest little book about a little girl teaching a deaf cat to cope, and she got it published. And she’s also turning into one helluva little photographer.” In reality, Susie Tracy never picked up a camera until two years after her father’s death. Moreover, the book Tracy allegedly refers to, Pritt, wasn’t published until 1982—more than twenty years after Davidson’s one interview with Tracy occurred. Indeed, the cat the book is about hadn’t even been born yet.
65 no memory: Pat Newcomb to Selden West, via telephone, 7/16/93 (SW). Newcomb said that she would have remembered any talk of Hepburn “because everyone was interested in that.”
66 “local reporters”: Joe Hyams to Selden West.
67 “You son of a bitch!”: Newquist, A Special Kind of Magic, p. 153.
68 Produced on a budget: Figures on Judgment at Nuremberg are from the Stanley Kramer Collection. As of May 11, 1966, United Artists was showing a loss of $1,585,900 for the picture.
CHAPTER 32 SOMETHING A LITTLE LESS SERIOUS
1 “tired of controversy”: Newsweek, 10/17/60.
2 “less serious”: According to Karen Kramer, it was Bosley Crowther who made the suggestion.
3 “monster chase story”: New York Times, 11/17/63.
4 “weeks and weeks”: Tania Rose to Stanley Kramer, n.d. (SK).
5 “From the onset”: New York Times, 11/17/63.
6 “The script and the casting”: New York Times, 11/17/63.
7 “I am eager”: Stanley Kramer to William Rose, 6/14/62, (SK).
8 “Tracy has never appeared”: Stanley Kramer to William Rose, 7/11/62 (SK).
9 “staring contest”: New York Times, 11/17/63.
10 “too much, too strenuous”: Ardmore, “Tracy,” n.d.
11 The deal: According to production records, Milton Berle and Ethel Merman were the highest-paid cast members apart from Tracy—each got $155,000 for doing the film. Sid Caesar was paid $135,000, Buddy Hackett and Mickey Rooney $105,000 each.
12 “We didn’t know”: Los Angeles Times, 3/29/01.
13 “The comedians”: Marshall Schlom to the author.
14 “made me flash back”: Sid Caesar (with Eddy Friedfeld), Caesar’s Hours (New York: Public Affairs, 2003), p. 276.
15 “Everyone knew”: Dorothy Provine to the author, via telephone, 11/17/05.
16 “Monroe had died”: Caesar, Caesar’s Hours, p. 276.
17 “We had rubber masks”: Los Angeles Times, 12/3/63.
18 “During the filming”: Deschner, The Films of Spencer Tracy, p. 17.
19 “The people whose memories”: ST to Pete Martin.
20 “It had been budgeted”: Marshall Schlom to the author, via e-mail, 12/16/07.
21 Youngstein: In Berlin, Max Youngstein told the assembled press that Kramer possessed the simple idea that a picture could be good and yet be successful. “We are a world-wide industry,” he said. “We must get smart and back the Stanley Kramers of the world, who have more guts and talent than the others put together.”
22 “get rid of the comics”: Los Angeles Times, 11/18/62.
23 “a project”: According to clinic records, Tracy donated $32,650 for the year 1962. In the years 1963 and 1964—years in which he did not work—his contributions amounted to $16,800 and $19,300, respectively.
24 “He smiled”: Hepburn, Me, pp. 56–57.
25 “specific memories”: Katharine Houghton to the author, via e-mail, 4/11/09.
26 “enjoying the rain”: Katharine Hepburn to Ella Winter, “Christmas” [1962], Ella Winter Collection, Columbia University.
27 “read a great deal”: Katharine Hepburn to Heeley and Kramer.
28 “greatly calmed”: Brownlow, David Lean, pp. 485–86.
29 “should have quit”: Ardmore, “Tracy.”
30 “It was so hard”: Kennedy, “Spencer Called Her Kath.”
31 “I would appreciate”: John Ford to ST, 6/10/63 (SLT).
32 “very quiet”: Katharine Hepburn to Ella Winter, 6/2/63, Ella Winter Collection.
33 “Be calm”: Details of Tracy’s edema attack are from Los Angeles Times, 7/22, 7/23, 7/24, and 8/3/63; Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, 7/22 and 8/2/63; and Selden West’s interview with Sally Erskine.
34 “SEE WHAT HAPPENS”: George Cukor to ST, 7/23/63 (SLT).
35 “thinking about Spencer”: Tim Durant to Katharine Hepburn, 8/7/63 (KHLA).
36 “have her choice”: New Castle News, 9/14/63.
37 “It wouldn’t do”: James Prideaux, Knowing Hepburn (Boston: Faber and Faber, 1996), p. 23.
38 “soccer players”: Frank Sinatra, at “A Tribute to Spencer Tracy,” Majestic Theatre, New York, 3/3/86 (courtesy of American Academy of Dramatic Arts).
39 “Mr. Tracy is funny”: New York Times, 11/19/63.
40 “director’s chair”: Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, 6/24/64.
41 “dropped 35 pounds”: Yuma Daily Sun, 7/7/64.
42 “good or better”: Newark Evening News, 7/14/64.
43 “I’m from M-G-M”: Marshall Schlom to the author, via e-mail, 8/15/06.
44 “feel of a western”: David Weddle, If They Move … Kill ’Em! (New York: Grove Press, 1994), p. 257.
45 “in his dressing gown”: Ring Lardner, Jr., to Charles Higham.
46 “bellyache”: Spencer Tracy, 1964 datebook (in Katharine Hepburn’s hand) (SLT).
47 “disquieting”: George Cukor to Katharine Hepburn, 9/30/64 (KHLA).
48 “hard to know”: Tracy, 1964 datebook (in Katharine Hepburn’s hand).
49 “Spence very thrown”: Ibid.
50 “Don’t EVER do this”: Susie Tracy to the author.
51 “always some reason”: Dr. Mitchel Covel to Selden West, 8/18/92 (SW).
52 “familiar grin”: Jared Brown, Alan J. Pakula: His Films and His Life (New York: Ba
ck Stage Books, 2005), pp. 64–65.
53 “tiny little life”: Hepburn, Me, pp. 405–06.
54 Tracy was groggy: Dr. Covel consulted his notes to provide details on Tracy’s worsening condition.
CHAPTER 33 A LION IN A CAGE
1 “We needed prayers”: Louise Tracy to Mary Kennedy Taylor, 9/22/65, Taylor Collection.
2 “When Louise would come”: Dr. Mitchel Covel to Selden West.
3 “hated to be sick”: Interview with Ardmore, 7/5/72.
4 “bumped into her”: Virginia Thielman to Jane Ardmore, 8/1/72 (JKA).
5 “shake hands”: John Tracy to Selden West, via fax, 3/23/98 (SW).
6 “If I hadn’t known”: Frank Tracy to Selden West, via telephone, October 1995 (SW).
7 “sort of an invalid”: Katharine Houghton to the author, via e-mail, 8/12/08.
8 “all major problems”: Dr. Mitchel Covel to Selden West. It should be noted that Dr. Covel did not consider his patient a hypochondriac. “A hypochondriac is somebody who imagines they have illness,” he said. “He had illness, and would react violently to some of his symptoms. But, mind you, he had a lot of problems, a lot of physical problems. His heart, diabetes.”
9 “Bullshit”: McCabe, Cagney, p. 330.
10 “Your letter”: Eugene Cullen Kennedy, “Just Above Sunset, Off Doheny,” unpublished manuscript (courtesy of Eugene Kennedy).
11 “The substance”: Deposition of Stanley Kramer in Joseph Than and Elick Moll v. Columbia Pictures Corp., etc., Stanley Kramer, Sidney Poitier, William Rose, et al., 1/20/69, (SK).
12 “they budgeted it”: Stanley Kramer to Heeley and Kramer.
13 “I pointed out”: Deposition of William Arthur Rose in Joseph Than and Elick Moll v. Columbia Pictures Corp., etc., Stanley Kramer, Sidney Poitier, William Rose, et al.
14 “He took the ball”: Stanley Kramer deposition.
15 “Stanley, who was in California”: William Arthur Rose deposition.
16 “My suggestions”: Stanley Kramer deposition.
17 “One of the things”: William Arthur Rose deposition.
18 “first ‘live’ time”: ST to William Dozier, 8/26/66.
19 “I’ll do a Batman”: Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, 9/26/66.
20 “now president of Fox”: William Self to the author.
21 “no thought of going”: Swindell, Spencer Tracy, p. 263.
22 “The anticipation”: Stanley Kramer deposition.
23 “I feel great”: Details of the news conference are from Los Angeles Times, 9/26/66; Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, 9/26/66; and Long Beach Independent, 9/26/66.
24 “a gasp”: Laraine Day to Barbara Hall.
25 “taken aback”: Susie Tracy to the author, Brentwood, 5/13/05.
26 “see my niece”: Newquist, A Special Kind of Magic, pp. 42–43.
27 “my trepidation”: Stanley Kramer deposition.
28 “ ‘can she act?’ ”: Karen Kramer to the author, North Hollywood, 7/21/04.
29 “lucky girl”: Los Angeles Times, 2/3/67.
30 “pretty well controlled”: Dr. Mitchel Covel to Selden West.
31 “When I arrived”: Sidney Poitier, The Measure of a Man (San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 2000), pp. 121–22.
32 “colored person”: Newquist, A Special Kind of Magic, pp. 91–92.
33 “decent folks”: Poitier, The Measure of a Man, pp. 122–23.
34 “delicious meal”: Sidney Poitier, This Life (New York: Knopf, 1980), pp. 285–86.
35 “once-over”: Katharine Houghton to the author, via e-mail, 5/29/09.
36 “chopping block”: Higham, Kate, p. 198.
37 “His idea”: Marshall Schlom to the author.
38 makeup test: According to Michael Blake, this was a common practice in color filmmaking through the mid-1970s, when film speeds got faster and less light was necessary to bring out the features of darker skin. Without makeup, lighter-skinned actors would typically wash out. “As for the correct term, we would say ‘bump up their color,’ which means take them a bit darker than their natural skin tone.” Cinematographer Sam Leavitt, who had shot the black-and-white Defiant Ones for Kramer, favored TV-style lighting for much of the picture, possibly to minimize problems of skin tone and contrast, possibly to shoot more quickly at times when Tracy was available. A trade item in the Reporter noted that Leavitt, at Kramer’s request, had suspended all the lighting needed to illuminate the set from above—no floor lamps or fill lights—so that Kramer could make circular shots if he wished.
39 “In the rehearsals”: Higham, Kate, p. 200.
40 “My aunt”: Katharine Houghton to the author, Sherman Oaks, 3/1/05.
41 “The key to Spencer”: Jack Hamilton, “A Last Visit with Two Undimmed Stars,” Look, 7/11/67.
42 “all the words”: Sidney Poitier to David Heeley and Joan Kramer, Los Angeles, 1986 (TH).
43 “quite a few scenes”: Katharine Hepburn to Heeley and Kramer. In his autobiography Poitier remembers asking Kramer to send them home, and the production report for that day appears to bear that out: Tracy and Hepburn finished at 4:50 p.m., while Poitier remained on the set until 6:45.
44 “play tennis”: Leah Bernstein to the author, Los Angeles, 9/14/04.
45 “strange relationship”: Higham, Kate, p. 201.
46 “Your job”: Katharine Houghton to the author.
47 “he was embarrassed”: Marshall Schlom to the author.
48 “tried to work him”: Katharine Houghton to the author.
49 “Milkman”: Hamilton, “A Last Visit with Two Undimmed Stars.”
50 “best actor”: Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, 4/30/67.
51 “my last picture”: Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, 5/10/67.
52 “I miss M-G-M”: Spencer Tracy interview with Roy Newquist, cassette tape, n.d. (courtesy of Susie Tracy).
53 “Uncle Spencer?”: Bobs Watson to Selden West, via telephone, 7/9/91 (SW).
54 “go visit him”: Jean Simmons to the author.
55 “Please wait”: A. C. Lyles to the author.
56 “love of your life”: Katharine Houghton in A Special Kind of Love, Sony Home Entertainment, 2007.
57 “One night”: Katharine Houghton to the author.
58 “Watch out for Kate”: Katharine Houghton to the author, New York, 4/25/08.
59 “walked into this house”: Katharine Houghton to the author, New York, 3/1/05.
60 “the summation”: Stanley Kramer to Heeley and Kramer.
61 “tenser than tense”: Mark Harris, Pictures at a Revolution (New York: Penguin, 2008), p. 322.
62 after some preliminaries: Tracy may well have delivered the entire speech on set before any film got exposed, as there are witnesses who recall that he did it straight through. “As I remember it,” said Katharine Houghton, “he did the whole damn thing from beginning to end.” An examination of the film establishes, however, that it could not have been shot in one take, and the daily production reports clearly show the scene took five days to complete.
63 “first day’s work: Details of the production of Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner are from the daily production reports in the Stanley Kramer Collection at UCLA.
64 “I came to visit”: Karen Kramer to the author.
65 “Our reaction shots”: Katharine Houghton to the author, via e-mail, 7/24/05.
66 “superb, moving”: Los Angeles Times, 6/12/67.
67 “Every person”: Poitier, This Life, pp. 286–87.
68 “very relieved”: Katharine Houghton to the author, via e-mail, 7/24/05.
69 “You know, Kiddo”: Wagner, You Must Remember This, p. 293.
70 “He didn’t know”: Tina Smith to the author, Milwaukee, 7/9/06.
71 “I rehearsed”: Katharine Hepburn to Heeley and Kramer.
72 “shot the scene”: Marshall Schlom to the author, via e-mail, 4/10/09.
73 “rehearsed quite a bit”: D’Urville Martin to Selden West, 12/27/77 (SW).
74 Iva
n Volkman: Details of Tracy’s last shot on the picture are from Marshall Schlom. It was customary for the assistant director to make such an announcement, but Marshall Schlom remembered that Volkman, who had been Kramer’s A.D. until he was promoted to production manager on Ship of Fools, claimed the privilege for himself on this occasion.
75 “made me wild”: Katharine Hepburn to Heeley and Kramer.
76 “The party”: Details of the party are from Daily Variety, 5/29/67; Los Angeles Times, 6/12/67; and Bob Thomas’ AP dispatch, 5/31/67.
77 “Finished!”: New York Times, 6/25/67.
78 “very pleased”: Interview with Ardmore, 7/5/72.
79 “No bunk”: Miscellaneous handwritten notes for Chester Erskine’s proposed documentary on Tracy, evidently made between June and December 1967 (KHLA).
80 “Eddie Leonard”: Los Angeles Times, 6/12/67.
81 “I went to see him”: Dr. Mitchel Covel to Selden West.
82 “He would wear”: Susie Tracy to the author.
83 “Sometimes he would carry”: Interview with Ardmore, 7/5/72.
84 “give it a push”: Hepburn, Me, p. 402.
85 the phone rang: Susie Tracy to the author, Brentwood, 5/13/05.
86 “peculiar spot”: Hepburn, Me, p. 404.
87 “Some idiot called”: Jean Simmons to the author.
88 “up to par”: Jean Porter Dmytryk to the author.
89 “state of shock”: Milwaukee Journal, 6/11/67.
90 “true to himself”: Dallas Morning News, 6/15/67.
CHAPTER 34 A HUMBLE MAN
1 “seen his face”: Hepburn, Me, p. 408.
2 “Nobody gets out”: Frank Tracy to Selden West.
3 “don’t like anything”: Newsweek, 6/19/67.
4 “strong and vibrant”: New York Times, 6/18/67.
5 “I can’t explain”: Stanley Kramer, “He Could Wither You With a Glance,” Life, 6/30/67.
6 “fine example”: Katharine Hepburn to William O. Douglas, 6/18/67 (LOC).
7 “What can one say”: Katharine Hepburn to Joan Blondell, 6/23/67 (courtesy of Judy Samelson).
8 “unique creature”: Katharine Hepburn to Anne Pearce Kramer, 6/17/67 (courtesy of Judy Samelson).
9 “there is silence”: Katharine Hepburn to Jack Hamilton, 6/27/67 (courtesy of Judy Samelson).
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